I was a member of the San Bernardino Railroad Historical Society, the group which had been working on the restoration of Santa Fe 4-8-4 3751 that had been located in Viaduct Park near the San Bernardino station. The group started the restoration in June 1981 with an initial evaluation and over the next few years, minor work was done in the park. In January 1986, a work session was held at what would become 3751's future shop at California Steel Industries in Fontana and in April of that year, the engine was rolled out of the park and taken to the Fontana Shop.
In the autumn of 1990, the proposed California Limited excursion was announced and I had a Segment 2 Barstow-to-Bakersfield first class ticket for April 30, 1991, when the engine was going to Railfair 1991 in Sacramento. In April 1991, although the group did its best to try to have the locomotive, they decided to postpone the excursion to a later date.
I still believed the group would complete the restoration so I stuck by them, on June 23, 1991 the giant awoke after 38 years of slumber and on August 13, the engine moved under its own power for the first time since August 25, 1953. The excursion was then scheduled for after Christmas, so I was issued another first class ticket for the new trip which would only go as far as Bakersfield but I would finally be able to ride across the Tehachapi Mountains.
The Desert Wind 36 12/27/1991
It was my Christmas vacation from MacArthur Fundamental Intermediate, after the junior varsity girls basketball team which I coached went undefeated and was my first championship basketball team. My father drove me to Fullerton to catch the Desert Wind for Barstow and we arrived there early.
After about thirty minutes, here came 3751 and the all-private car train travelling east through Fullerton. I said goodbye to my father, who could not believe I was going to be riding behind that engine tomorrow then walked over to the station to wait for the Desert Wind and boarded. The conductor could not believe I was just going to Barstow instead of Ogden, until I told him that I was riding behind 3751 tomorrow to Bakersfield and he wished he could be going with me. We proceeded east through Santa Ana Canyon until Colton, where I went on 3751 alert and took the "short way" to reach San Bernardino, where, holding the mainline in "A" yard was 3751 and its train, waiting patiently for us to do our station work.
I went to the lounge car for the journey over Cajon Pass and there were people with cameras everywhere waiting for the steam train to storm over the pass, all of whom had a preview with our Desert Wind. We went up Cajon via Sullivan's Curve and the tunnels before passing through the high cut at Summit and entering the high desert, then slid around freight trains at Lugo before travelling through Hesperia and Victorville. An hour later, we arrived at Barstow where I detrained and walked up the hill to my hotel, then went for dinner and arrived back just as 3751 arrived in, which I witnessed from my room. I enjoyed an evening of television before calling it a night so I would be rested for tomorrow's big day of riding.
Santa Fe 3751 West 12/28/1991
It had rained overnight and the wind was really howling as I walked out of my hotel room towards the train then stopped at a doughnut shop for breakfast before walking over the bridge across the old Barstow Yard. Down below at the north end of the bridge was Santa Fe 3751 West waiting to depart at 9:00 AM The lighting was perfect for pictures as I stared at the machine which would pull me to Bakersfield and the crowd was beginning to build, so I walked down by the engine for a quick picture before I waited to board the dome-lounge "Plaza Santa Fe". Boarding finally commenced and I chose the front seat on the right so I could enjoy the view over our train and before our departure time, Union Pacific and Santa Fe paraded freight trains by us.
This special excursion's consist was Santa Fe 4-8-4 3751, Santa Fe FP45 97, Santa Fe FP45 95, Santa Fe combine 1517, combine "Santa Cruz", Santa Fe 10-6 sleeper "Palm Leaf", lounge car "Overland Trail", New York Central sleeper "Norma Petersen", Union Pacific sleeper "Regina Wendt", Canadian National lounge-sleeper "Belle McKee" (nee Cape Brulé), Pennsylvania Railroad sleeper "Colonial Crafts, Canadian Pacific baggage/horse car "Pony Express", Union Pacific sleeper "National Forum" Denver and Rio Grande Western "Eagle Canõn", tavern-lounge 113 "Pere Marquette", unnamed observation-lounge, Seaboard dining car "New River Gorge" dome-coach "Silver Garden", Santa Fe dome-lounge "Plaza Santa Fe", and California Zephyr dome-observation "Silver Solarium".
With a blast of the whistle, the train slowly began to roll forward past the Barstow station, which was under restoration, and under the highway bridge over which I had walked, then slowly eased onto the main line and began to pick up speed as it rolled along the north side of the vast Barstow Yard. We passed the eastbound main line fuleling pads with freights being topped off before resuming their journey east. A few minutes later, we passed the westbound fuelling pads then went by the Barstow Diesel Servicing Facility with a vast assortment of locomotive models present, before slowing as we made our way to Valley Junction. Here, we switched onto Santa Fe's Mojave Subdivision for the ride to Bakersfield, which was new mileage, and in addition, 3751 put on quite a show with its smoke.
The train curved off the huge wye and out onto the Mojave River bridge where the steam engine slowly began to accelerate with great stack talk. My view from the dome was fantastic as I was really enjoying the engine puttting on a show. We crossed Highway 58 where we came upon most of the chasers for this morning's segment to Mojave, and crossed the road with everyone waving. We passed the small town of Hinkley with most of the townspeople watching our train pass through. From here, we climbed the short grade to Jim Grey siding, a place from which I once watched trains, then closed in on the highway and at Four Corners, crossed Highway 395 with many curious onlookers, who must have not known we were coming through. Our tracks made a beeline to Boron, passing underneath Highway 58 east of town then we passed the old red Boron depot before reaching the switch for the industrial trackage located to the north of the highway. To our south was Edwards Air Force Base, a vast expanse of High Desert with a huge dry lake bed that the space shuttle had used for its landings. Our pacers were doing a great job of staying with us as we made our way to Silt before descending down a short grade and a slight climb to Edwards, where a photo runby was held.
After everyone detrained, the special train reversed and ran by us with the engine producing excellent sound but not too much smoke. With everyone satisfied, we reboarded and left the highway while the train climbed the grade between the hills through Bissell as I scouted future photographic locations. We began the approach to the Tehachapi Mountains by passing through Sanborn and at the Highway 14 bridge south of Mojave, there were more chasers waiting for us as we entered the trackage of the Southern Pacific for the journey over the Tehachapi Mountains to Kern Junction in Bakersfield.
As the train slowly made its way through Mojave, I walked the length of the train to explore the private cars, which were most impressive and it was quite a collection of equipment. I felt proud that the San Bernardino Railroad Historical Society was able to make this trip a success after the former Santa Fe coaches from Indiana were not able to be brought out and the group had to scramble to get cars almost at the last minute. A special thank you to all the private car owners who allowed their cars to be used and this trip would not have happened without their kind support. Thank you also to everyone who made this trip possible.
I was back in my front dome seat about two miles north of Mojave, where the hills here were covered with windmills to produce electricity. We were paralleling the mountains at this point and negotiated a series of very gentle curves and the highway was jammed with pacers, then we turned to the left to reach the 2.3 percent grade following Cache Creek up its canyon into the mountains before rounding a large sweeping curve with 3751 really working as a few more people came up into the dome. The canyon narrowed with the traffic on Highway 58 running at the same speed as the train then passed the location of Cameron, where a large crowd was waiting for us at the grade crossing.
We turned right and steamed our way up one of the longer tangent tracks on the mountain, ducked under Highway 58 and curved on the long sweeping turn into Monolith, with its large cement plant. At the grade crossing, there was an even larger group of people who then paced us over the summit of the pass and into the Town of Tehachapi, where the steam engine was watered and serviced. I was just really excited to be finally crossing the Tehachapi Mountains by train after all of these years.
We departed Tehachapi with the pacers waiting for us at the highway bridge west of town then went under all of them into the canyon of Tehachapi Creek, where we rounded another large sweeping curve to the Cable crossovers. The trip through the canyon could best be described as 3751 snaking its way west on the descending grade, as many photographers were perched above us on the ledges. We snaked our way to Cable and the end of double track, entering the tunnel- after-tunnel section as the canyon narrowed with the tracks high above the creek on the south aside of the creek and the highway on the north side. We were drifting downgrade, so there was not much smoke through the four tunnels here, then reached Marcel siding as the train twisted its way west and entered Tunnel 12, while more people came into the dome car. We passed through that tunnel, then Tunnel 11 before entered Tunnel 10 and upon exiting, everyone had the view they had been anticipating, namely the Tehachapi Loop below us and ready for us to circle it.
People were everywhere awaiting this spectacle and we turned left to the switch of Walong siding before the right hand turn took us out onto the loop. 3751 crossed high above Tunnel 9 before we circled to the right, making our journey around the Tehachapi Loop, then entered Tunnel 9 as the steam engine whistled and rang its bell. Exiting this tunnel, I had finally ridden around the Tehachapi Loop. We curved to the right, with where we had just been out of the window to the right, then crossed Tehachapi Creek while making a reverse curve to the left and minutes later, crossed the creek again before curved to the right and arriving at Woodford as 3751 drifted downgrade.
3751 snaked its way through Woodford, crossing Tehachapi Creek near the west end before ducking under Highway 58 for the last time. We then rounded another large horseshoe curve before crossing Tehachapi Creek once more, twisting our way to Rowen with the creek dropping off rapidly. We lost sight of the highway before entering Tunnels 8 and 7, which led us to Cliff, set high on a ledge with Tehachapi Creek far below. As the train twisted and turned through there, the view looking down was incredible as I could see all the way down to the horseshoe curve at Caliente, which we would round in about twenty minutes. A hard left turn was made at the west end of Cliff before we plunged into Tunnel 5 and exited to a hard right hand turn to reach Tunnel 3.
This area of the Tehachapi Mountains was forever altered on July 21st, 1952, when a 7.5 magnitude earthquake destroyed much of the line and damaged all of the tunnels in this area. When they rebuilt the line, 206 feet of Tunnel 3's east end was day-lighted, Tunnel 4 was abandoned, Tunnel 5 suffered major damage and Tunnel 6 was day-lighted. To open the line to traffic while Tunnel 5 was being rebuilt, a shoofly was built around Tunnel 5, so that train service could be restored 26 days after the earthquake. It was possible to see where the shoofly was if you looked at the correct spot. The quake also knocked down the water tower at Tehachapi and it was quite the seismic event.
We popped into Tunnel 3 before reaching the east switch at Bealville, where a great crowd was waiting for us, as this was the next point of public access since Woodford. These people would meet the train again at Caliente about a mile down the road, but about five miles by rail, which everyone on the train was enjoying. We made our way through Bealville, twisting downgrade and rounded yet another horseshoe curve before making our way to the west switch at Bealville, then plunged into Tunnel 2 with many fans on the ridge above. We made a sweeping turn to the right, travelling east to reach Tunnel 1, which we exited and twisted our way to the great horseshoe curve at Caliente. We crossed over Caliente-Bealville Road and Tehachapi Creek before we turned left around the horseshoe curve with the whole train easily seen along with the throngs of railfans, then reached the east switch of Caliente. We went through the grade crossing with a large crowd on hand to witness our passage before we continued to follow Tehachapi Creek to the west end of Caliente, and our passage through the Narrows, after which we attained Ilmon before crossing Tehachapi Creek and curved to the left, crossing the creek again for the last time to Bena where the double track began.
After drifting downgrade since Tehachapi, 3751 had to work up the short hill to Sandcut and once at the top of that grade, 3751 had reached the San Joaquin Valley for the rest of the journey to Bakersfield. The parallel road was jammed with chasers and at every grade crossing, people were gathered to watch our steam train. We passed through Edison with its agricultural pursuits before the outskirts of Bakersfield, where more people were out as we reached Southern Pacific's Bakersfield Yard, then a few minutes later, arrived at Kern Junction, where we left Southern Pacific rails for the home rails of Santa Fe. We travelled due west for over two miles through downtown Bakersfield to the Santa Fe yard and the Amtrak station, where our excursion came to an end.
I detrained and went straight into the Amtrak trailer to buy a ticket on the next bus/train home to Santa Ana. With over two hours to spare, I walked to the front of the train to admire 3751 and thanked the crew for the safe and unique excursion. The crew then took the train west to Jastro to wye the train for tomorrow's trip back to Barstow before returning to the depot area. I enjoyed 3751 until departure time arrived and I boarded the Thruway bus for a rainy trip over the Grapevine to Los Angeles, and a San Diegan for home, thus ending a very special and unique steam trip and my first ride around the Tehachapi Loop.
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